How Special Education Litigation Takes Place: An Example from Baltimore, Maryland

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Thursday 4:15 pm - Gold 1
  In Roundtable Session: The role of Policy and Law in Shaping Solutions to Problem of Practice in Schooling

Abstract

What can historical analysis of long-term consent decrees reveal about local disability and schooling contexts? I address this question regarding Vaughn G. v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore's origins and successive consent decrees, contrasting its settlement with failed efforts to satisfy its prior consent decrees. Filed in 1984 and concluded in 2012, this case significantly reshaped Baltimore's schooling governance. Bearing some hallmarks of contemporary special education litigation, this analysis demonstrates its inextricable links to social, political, and educational pasts that are specific to Baltimore and Maryland. This paper illuminates possibilities of case law to illuminate complex interplays of law, education, and history in particular geographic contexts and raises questions about who is prioritized and valued in legal disputes in education.

Author

• Joel Miller, University of Maryland